They are dramatic moments, caught on camera, as a man in Beech Grove, Indiana, trying to stop a criminal’s getaway ended up becoming a victim himself. The man was dragged across a parking lot and injured, all because he attempted to intervene. The crime the driver was trying to get away from would likely have been a misdemeanor offense before it escalated. I cannot stand a thief,” said Chris White. The 31-year-old landscaper proved just how much Tuesday morning when he went after a suspected shoplifter running out of the Lowe’s in Beech Grove. “There’s two way to live. The good way, the right way or the wrong way,” said White.
Police say the suspect was doing the latter when he stole a power tool from the store. Surveillance video captured it all, from start to finish. On the video you can see the suspect pulling into the store’s parking lot that morning. Then you see him walking through the front door. Moments later, the video shows the suspect picking up a box, then quickly leaving. “As soon as I seen it, I jumped out of my truck and ran after him,” said White. On the video, White is seen holding onto the driver’s side window of the suspect.
“I was holding onto the car and he couldn’t get me off. He couldn’t shake me off so he smacked me against cars,” White explained. “He was like, ‘Just get off my car!’ I was like, ‘Well then, just stop and let me off and I will,'” White recalled telling the man. White says the man didn’t listen and instead slammed him into another car. Then came the second one. “I don’t remember anything after that,” White said, except waking up in a hospital with four broken ribs, a punctured lung and large scrapes all over his body. “That’s from a tire, yep,” said White.
After spending the night in the hospital, White was released. He says he’d do it again, even with his injuries. “It’s just me being a good person, I can’t help it,” said White. His wife isn’t surprised by his actions. “It don’t surprise me at all because of his heart because he knows that wasn’t right what that man did. He shouldn’t have stole,” said Jodie White. “If I have to pay for it, you’re going to pay for it too,” she added. White just hopes at some point, the suspect pays, too. [Source: WTRH13 News]